Two days later the Marmions left London for Copenhagen, whence they intended to take a trip among the Baltic Islands, now looking their brightest and prettiest, then up along the Norwegian Fiords, just before the tourist rush began, and finally across from Trondjem to Iceland. They were both excellent sailors, and both disliked crowds, especially when the said crowds were pleasure-hunting. Moreover, they had now a particular reason for being alone that they might enjoy together--they, the only two mortals who could do so--the countless marvels of that new existence which had now become possible for them. Where, too, could they do this to more advantage than in the ancient Northland, whose marvellous past would now be to them even as the present of their own temporal lives? The Van Huysmans, and, of course, Lord Lester Leighton, were to remain in London until the end of the Season. Uncle Ephraim had cabled warm congratulations and large credits, and so Brenda, very naturally as a newly-engaged girl and a prospective Countess, wanted all that London and Ranelagh and Henley, Ascot and Goodwood and Cowes, could give her before her devoted lover's yacht carried them off to the Mediterranean. Later in the autumn they were all to go over to the States to spend the winter in Washington and New York, whence they were to return to London for the wedding in May: surely as pleasant a programme--I fear that Miss Brenda spelt it "program"--as could be desired even by a fair maiden upon whom the kindly Fates had already showered their choicest gifts. The only bitter drop in the family cup of content was the fact that Professor van Huysman was as far away as ever from the exposure of the fallacy which, as he was immovably convinced, those abominable demonstrations _must_ contain. After due consultation between Nicol Hendry and his colleagues of France, Germany, and Russia, it was decided to follow up the clues which he had so mysteriously received. The others would, of course, have been very glad to know where and how he got them, but at the outset he had put them on their honour not to ask, and so professional etiquette made it impossible for them to do anything but accept his assurance that he had received them from a source which was quite beyond reproach. Once they accepted the situation, they got to work with a quiet thoroughness which resulted in the spreading of an invisible but unbreakable net round the footsteps of every one of the suspects from the great Oscarovitch himself to the humble seller of curios in Candler's Court, and his still humbler friends Pent-Ah and Neb-Anat, who were known to the few who knew them as Mr and Mrs Pentana, renovators, and, possibly manufacturers, of ancient gems and relics. But to one pair of eyes, at least, the police-net was as plainly visible as a spider's web hanging in the sunlight.